Recently I had the opportunity to take a two-session class on drawing whimsical animals. Seeing as I can’t even draw a good stick figure, I felt a “whimsical” class would suit me better than taking a “realistic” animal drawing class. Besides, I feel whimsical animals are better suited to my mixed media pieces than realistic animals.

We worked on the basics like eye placement and how changing the eyes and eye brows can totally affect the mood portrayed by the animal.

Testing out eye placement and eyebrows.

After copying different animals the instructor provided, we worked on our first mixed media piece. The teacher asked that we include at least two animals and there be some kind of story between them. This is what I came up with.

My first attempt at drawing whimsical animals.

Putting clothes on animals is a sure way to add whimsy. I even gave my rabbit red boots to wear with her flowered dress.

We had a week between classes so I practiced drawing all kinds of whimsical animals. Here are some of my practice pieces.

This skyward looking bunny actually started out as and owl.

Kitties

Owls

More owls

And yet another owl.

Whimsical donkeys

The second session had us copying one of the instructors pictures. The funny thing was, I thought her animal was a deer and my other classmate thought it was a rabbit. The teacher said it was actually a peacock. Since only the head was showing, we all saw it a different way. So our instruction was to copy her picture, but make the animal into what we wanted it to be. Here is just the head shot of my funny deer.

My whimsical deer.

I had a lot of fun in that class and I am quickly filling up a journal with funny animal doodles. My goal is to create several animals in a style that is completely my own.

If you are in the Fredericksburg, Virginia area. You can find the drawing whimsical animals class at Lord and Lilly’s, 611 Caroline Street, 540-371-1333.

Drawing whimsical animals or people is an ideal outlet for those of us who are stick-figure challenged!